Electrical connectors and cables are commonly fished through a conduit, or tight passageway, by first attaching the connector or cable to a fish tape. A typical fish tape may include a drawing head that has an elongated, flexible wire and means for enclosing the electrical terminations. The fish tape is then fed backward through one end of a conduit. At the opposite end of the conduit, the fish tape is attached to the cable and pulled back through, the conductor and cable being drawn through with it. The fish tape and drawing head are then detached. A problem that occurs with fish tapes or drawing heads is that they often get caught in bends or obstructions in the conduit and cannot be pulled through. This is especially true where the cables are stiff electrical cables that comprise bundled conductors. Often, they can become jammed in a conduit and possibly damaged. This process is extremely labor-intensive and expensive for manufacturers of equipment having internally-routed terminated electrical cables.
In Noonan, U.S. Pat. No. 5,505,432, the fish tape is provided with an anti-snagging device to minimize jams in the conduit. The device includes a spherical roller to roll over obstructions in a conduit so that the fish tape is freely fed and retracted through the conduit. Similarly, in Langston, U.S. Pat. No. 5,029,816, a fiber optic cable is pulled through a conduit with a series of large-diameter capstan winches placed at intermediate access points along the conduit. Each capstan pulls a portion of the cables and if the cable snags, then the winches stop pulling. Although Noonan and Langston address the problem of snagging electrical conductors and fiber optic cables, they do not address the installation of cables with connectors.
Favalora et al, U.S. Pat. No. 5,480,203, discloses a pulling tool for cables and cables with connectors. The pulling tools have a mesh sleeve with an open end for receiving the ends of cables and a closed end with an attached pulling member. In Boero et al, U.S. Pat. No. 5,129,027, a drawing head pulls ribbon-type optical cables with connectors. The drawing head has grooves in a slotted core for receiving the optical fiber ribbons. Both Favalora et al and Boero et al enclose the connectors for protection. There is therefore a need in the art for an improved device and method for quickly and easily fishing connector-terminated electrical cables.